The general’s monocle, stuck between his eyelids like a shell splinter in his vulgar, scarred, overbearing face, in the middle of a forehead which it blinded like the Cyclops’ single eye, appeared to Swann like a monstrous wound that might have been glorious to receive, but was indecent to show off; whereas the one that M. de Bréauté added, as a badge of festivity, to the pearl-gray gloves, the opera hat, and the white tie, and substituted for the familiar lorgnette (as Swann himself did) for going out in society, bore, glued to its other side, like a natural history specimen under a microscope, an infinitesimal gaze teeming with friendliness that smiled constantly at the loftiness of the ceilings, the beauty of the preparations, the interest of the programs, and the excellence of the refreshments.

*****

The Marquis de Forestelle’s monocle was miniscule, had no border, and, requiring a constant painful clenching of the eye, where it was encrusted like a superfluous cartilage whose presence was inexplicable and whose material was exquisite, gave the Marquis’s face a melancholy delicacy, and made women think he was capable of great sorrows in love. But that of M. de Saint-Candé, surrounded by a gigantic ring, like Saturn, was the center of gravity of a face which regulated itself at each moment in relation to it, a face whose quivering red nose and thick-lipped sarcastic mouth attempted by their grimaces to equal the unceasing salvos of wit sparkling from the disk of glass, and saw itself preferred to the handsomest eyes in the world by snobbish and depraved young women in whom it inspired dreams of artificial charms and a refinement of voluptuousness . . .

How does one keep that glass firmly attached to one’s face, self wonders?

Levin lunching with his old friend Stepan Arkadyevich aka Stiva, whose wife Dolly has just discovered his affair:

Levin: You can’t imagine how it is for me, a country dweller, all this is as savage as the fingernails of the gentlemen I saw in your office.

Stiva (laughing): Yes, I saw how intrigued you were by poor Grinevich’s nails.

Levin: I can’t help it . . . Just imagine you’re me and take a country dweller’s point of view. In the country, we try to keep our hands in a state that makes them handy to work with; so we trim our nails and sometimes roll up our sleeves. But here people let their fingernails grow as long as they can stand it on purpose, and they wear cuff links like saucers so that they can’t do anything with their hands.

Stiva (smiling): Yes, it’s a sign that he doesn’t need to do rough labor. His mind does the work.

Self is fascinated by this glimpse into the foppish fashion of Muscovites.

Stiva seems like a good guy, a good friend to Levin. Ugh, but he’s really so entitled.

Dany’s lone walk across the beach — I kept expecting Gendry to pop up, but other than that, it was a great moment.

Brienne, as always, in any scene, kills.

Fails:

Knowing Sam’s poop/slop-like-poop scene was coming (from perusing last night’s Twitter feeds), I avoided looking at the screen just at this moment.

Euron rigged up with clothes more be-fitting a rock star than a warrior. He’s too pretty-looking.

GoT loves profanity but for some reason last night’s seemed (and I am including Cersei’s cold-blooded speech which seemed strangely empty, vacuous, BLANK, even with her use of the “c” word) pretty limp. Or perhaps I was just in a bad mood because I had watched vid of Gendry x Arya: “Pull your cock out and take a piss” and that, methinks, is an excellent use of another “c” word.

Meh:

Ed Sheeran needs a spray tan. Other than that, his moment with Arya was the sweetest of the episode.

With Trump’s win, there’s been a boom in dystopian Hunger Games fan fiction. A site went off-line today for a mere two hours. Self nearly had a meltdown.

Despite everyone hating Darren Aronofsky and semi-hating Passengers (Yes, the problem is no one knows whether it’s a rom-com or a space movie. Least of all Lionsgate), she’s the only actress the Guardian’s ever called “America’s national treasure.”

Vanity Fair has her on the cover of its 2016 Holiday issue. She’s not glammed up. She looks real. Self likes it so much better than the other Vanity Fair cover, the one where she was sitting in a jungle pool. It didn’t look like her.

The pictures inside the issue, especially the black-and-whites of her in an Alberta Ferretti dress: HAWWTTTT!!! Kudos to photographer Peter Lindbergh.

And, she is still a risk-taker. She’ll agree to do a movie just to get a chance to work with a particular director, even without seeing a script. That’s so completely her: impetuous, and NOT image-driven.

Julie Miller’s cover article begins:

The bar of the Plaza Athénée, an elegant Upper East Side hotel, is empty save for an elderly French couple sipping Bordeaux at two p.m. when in bursts a tall blonde crackling with energy. It is Jennifer Lawrence, wearing a black cashmere sweater, jeans ripped at the knee, and black boots, her platinum hair chopped into a chic bob. Delicate gold jewelry circles her wrists, neck, and fingers, and her most pronounced accessory, a security team, looms nearby.

Thus far in Anjelica Huston’s second memoir, Watch Me, (Chapter 3) Huston has been let down by that rotter JN (Jack Nicholson, natch) at least twice, and both times she has gotten over the disappointment and humiliation by climbing on the back of a friend’s Harley Davidson (the first time, she remember she wears “a Missoni cloak” which seems so random, but is also in a way helpful because self is taking fashion notes). The first time this happens is in Milan, the second time is in Paris.

Huston’s writing is wildly uneven. There are flashes of good writing, but they don’t last long. Most of the time, she just appears bored.

Huston introduces a friend, “Herky,” thus: “He was one of those rare beings who are well informed about almost everything: he had a vast knowledge and affection for art, cities, music, movies, and people.”

What does this mean?

She’ll write something like: “Later on that evening, June attempted to hypnotize me” and won’t describe the scene. Hello?

The paragraph immediately after said attempted hypnotizing, Huston is off to Corsica. Among her fellow passengers is “a large group of nuns.” Their plane gets hit by “a lightning storm.” They survive and Huston arrives at her hotel (She made it! Oh, thank GOD! Self was aching with tension) and “the hotel staff was almost entirely West African.”

Self’s niece, Irene, treated her to a day trip to Venice. We got off at Ferravia, opposite the beautiful Santa Lucia church, took a vaporetto to San Marco Square, and spent the rest of the day exploring adjacent shops. Mama mia, the luxury! The Asian women throwing their money around!

Self and her niece were often mistaken for Chinese. Which earned us A+ service in all the stores, including Prada, Gucci, Salvatore Ferragamo, Bottega Veneta, etc.

Handbag Detail: Either Gucci or Prada. The handbag costs a measly $1,500, a real bargain!

Mannequin’s Hand: Prada or Gucci or Ferragamo, Not Sure Which

And then we had late lunch at Café Florian on the square. What an opulent dining room, self is sure dear blog readers will agree:

With this week’s Photo Challenge — ORNATE — firmly in mind, self decided to take pictures of the most extravagant-looking footwear on display in the store windows. There were so many candidates. Here are her top three:

These extravagant SNEAKERS certainly make a statement!

Fabulous! Gold shoes are the BEST!

And, lastly, this killer pair!

Don’t dare be rude when I’m wearing these shoes! They were made for kicking butt!

Ah, Venezia. So extravagant, so passionate, so impractical and defiant.

Self will leave dear blog readers with the picture of a couple she watched surreptitiously (Venice always brings out her voyeuristic side!) in San Marcos Square this afternoon:

Sophia Loren is such a Fabulous Goddess of Cinema. She’s the new face of Dolce & Gabbana’s beauty line (Self wants that lipstick!) Here’s a snippet from her answers to “20 Odd Questions” in this week’s “Style & Fashion” section of The Wall Street Journal.

One of my secrets to success is: you should never do too much of one thing. You have to leave people saying, “If she had done even more, it would have been better.” Let them suffer!